Lola T93/30 - Racing History

Racing History

"Michele did one installation lap at Estoril and called me over. He lifted his visor and said, 'We're dead!'.
The F1 project was overseen personally by Broadley because, I think, he wanted to finish his career in glory. He came up with what was a very old-fashioned car."

Alessandro Mariani, Scuderia Italia senior engineer, on the T93/30.

The T93/30's début at the 1993 South African Grand Prix proved difficult: Alboreto and Badoer qualified slowest of all in 25th and 26th positions respectively, and reported that problems with the car's aerodynamics made it "virtually undriveable". Both drivers retired from the race with mechanical problems. For the second round of the championship, the official withdrawal of the March team – who had already missed the first round of the championship – from the sport reduced the number of competitors from 28 to 26. Correspondingly, it was declared that only the fastest 24 qualifiers would be permitted to start the race. The teams unanimously chose to raise this to 25 to ensure that every team could qualify at least one car, but Scuderia Italia's position was still precarious. However, both cars managed to qualify for and then finish the race, with Alboreto eleventh and Badoer twelfth.

At the European Grand Prix, Badoer set the slowest time and failed to qualify for the race, whilst Alboreto took another eleventh place finish. However, Alboreto then failed to qualify for the next race at Imola and of the five races after that, failed to qualify four times compared to Badoer's once. During this period, Badoer took the T93/30's best finish of seventh (only one place outside the points-paying positions) after an attritional San Marino race, and a further fifteenth place finish in Canada, whilst the team's other starts resulted in retirements. At the British Grand Prix, Badoer's retirement with electrical failure resulted in the deployment of the safety car, as his abandoned car was judged to be in a dangerous position. The T93/30 was now established as the slowest car in the field, a situation that appeared to have a more negative effect on Alboreto than Badoer.

Prior to the German Grand Prix, the teams unanimously agreed to allow all of the drivers to qualify for the race. However, this made no difference to the T93/30's competitiveness, and the drivers continued to qualify and race near or at the back of the field. Reliability was slightly improved, however, and the team managed its second double-finish at the Belgian Grand Prix. In addition, Badoer made it to the finish for three races in a row, including a top ten result at Scuderia Italia's second home race in Monza. This event was judged to be the car's most competitive performance of the year, helped by the fact that the Ferrari engines were equipped with pneumatic valves for the first time.

However, there was disappointment in the Lola camp, because Michele Alboreto could have scored one point in that race if the car had not broken down.

By this stage, Lola and Scuderia Italia had already announced that they would split for 1994, whilst Ferrari had also confirmed that it would no longer supply engines to the team. The relationship between Scuderia Italia and Lola had deteriorated, with each party blaming the other for the car's poor performance. Scuderia Italia even sent Sergio Rinland – who had designed the Dallara 188 used by the team in 1988 – to the Lola headquarters, only for him to be refused entry to the building. Following the Portuguese Grand Prix, with only two "fly-away" races held outside Europe remaining, Lucchini elected to end his team's campaign early. The T93/30's record thus stood at a combined 28 race entries with 21 starts and a best finish of seventh.